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The following biographical sketch was 
writtt-n by Hon. James Gray, formerly 
Mayor of Minneapolis. It was printed in 
the annual number of the Minneapolis 
Times, July 30, 1903, of which paper Mr. 
Gray was Chief Editor. The specific items 
of Mr. Walker's personal history were 
taken from various biographical histories, 
as well as from a personal acquaintance 
and twenty 3^ears' citizenship from which 
more or less of the facts and items and the 
general estimate of character given by Mr, 
Gray in this excellent sketch were gained. 



MAR 3 ^yif 



Sketch of the Life of Honorable 
Thomas B. Walker. 



Minneapolis Business Man, Financier, Philanthro- 
pist and Writer. Owner of the Greatest 
Absolutely Free Art Gallery in 
the World. 



That the greatness of a city is in its men is an accepted fact. Just 
as high as their minds soar, there is marked the limit of eminence 
attained by the community of which they are an integral part — pro- 
vided, of course, the soaring is practical. 

Fanciful flights of imagination, Utopian theories which lapse in- 
to film and vapor when brought into contact with the chill of prac- 
tical appreciation, never marked the fast, up-hill route travelled in 
the transition from log cabin to sky-scraper in the life of a city. 

A big city must necessarily be the work of big-minded men — men 
of many and varied qualities of energy, perseverance, tact and 
business sagacity. In such men Minneapolis is rich. 

From her pioneer days she has boasted of them. Through all 
the years of her making they have been with her. 

Her fortunes have been theirs and their fortunes have been hers. 

To enumerate all of these giants of the business and professional 
world would require many miles of type, but happily Minneapolis is 
fortunate in having as one of her favored sons a stalwart citizen of 
such sterling worth, versatility and breadth of character that he can 
be accepted as a typical Minneapolitan, embodying all of the virtues 
and characteristics most, commendable in his fellows and most no- 
ticeable to the student of civic affairs. 

His name is T. B. Walker, whose record and personality stand 
isolated by their brilliancy in a setting that is even all brightness 
itself; whose deeds have emblazoned his name inefifaceably on the 
loftiest pinnacle of public opinion and whose quiet, modestly anony- 
mous w-orks for Christianity and the human races have carved for 
him a golden throne not for the eyes of this world. 

In the pursuit of a vocation based on any one of his many accom- 
plishments T. B. Walker would have been a success. Had he con- 
fined himself to following any one of a score of lines which have 



contributed collectively to his fame he would still be a notable man. 
Few instances are there recorded where so many paths of achieve- 
ments have been followed by one man. 

In this respect Mr. Walker may perhaps best be described as in 
the class of which President Theodore Roosevelt and Kaiser Wil- 
helm of Germany are such notable exponents. His has been the 
strenuous life and the gentle, the useful and the adorning. Qualities 
have manifested themselves in him from the time when as a boy he 
first showed evidences of marvelous mathematical genius, which 
stamp him as a paragon. 

As an example to the youth of the nation he is worthy the atten- 
tion of the historian for many generations to come. 

A VERSATILE CHARACTER. 

How many men in the world are there who can class rightfully 
and by common verdict of their fellow citizens as well as the world 
in general, as a captain of industry, philanthropist, patron of art, 
scholar, scientist, litterateur, municipal expert, civil engineer, for- 
estry expert, lecturer, preacher, student of economics, traveler, 
lumberman and financier? 

It is safe to say that few city directories in the world today con- 
tain the name of such another man as this great Minneapolitan. 

To narrate in all their picturesque detail all of the eventful fea- 
tures of the career of Thomas B. Walker would be to enter into an 
all too extended word-picture, more than is permitted in the brief 
space here allotted. Therefore, in order that the story of the man's 
life be presented in comprehensive outline it is taken up chrono- 
logically. 

Thomas Barlow Walker belongs in that illustrious brotherhood of 
men who have won their way from a small beginning in the face of 
difficulties — that galaxy of indomitable spirits that has given to 
Ohio her wonderous place as the native state of presidents, states- 
men and leaders in the world of industry. 

He was born in Xenia, Green county, February 1, 1840, the third 
child of Piatt Bayless and Anstis Barlow Walker. His parents 
were in circumstances considered comfortable in those days of the 
development of the western reserve. His father was by trade a 
shoemaker, but by instinct and practice he was imbued with those 
characteristics which in these later days of strenuous development 
make a man the successful promoter of great enterprises. 

Thus does Thomas B. Walker come naturally by his wonderful 
btisiness sagacity and acumen. When the boy Thomas was but nine 
years of age there came into his life an event fraught with sorrow 
to his mother but of double significance to the child, whose tender 
youth obviated the realization of its meaning. 

His father having amassed sufficient working capital to embark 
in a venture which for those times was one of magnitude, invested 
all his means in a wagon train of merchandise with which he start- 
ed on the Long and perilous overland route to California, for this 



^vas in the year 1849 — that historic epoch-making period marked by 
the gold fever of the virgin west. 

Hardly had the expedition reached the gateway to the western 
plains when its chief was stricken with cholera, which was then 
sweeping the country. Death overcame him on the plains near 
Warrensburg, Mo. Now came the blow which, seemingly greater 
than the grief-stricken widow could bear at the time, was perhaps 
pregnant with greater force in the making of the orphaned boy's 
character than could be given to the child or woman to grasp in the • 
hours of their affliction. The merchandise train was carried 
through to its destination and the goods sold at the enormously in- 
flated prices which then prevailed in the new-found El Dorado of 
California. But not a penny of the proceeds ever reached the 
widow and her fatherless babes. 

HIS MOTHER'S MAINSTAY. 

Then began the mother's brave battle against adversity and the 
children's pitiful efforts to console and aid her and to contribute to 
the family's little store. Spurred on by the beacon light kindled 
by his noble and devoted mother, young Thomas began to bend his 
efforts toward fitting himself to take up the battle which his mother 
was thus obliged for a time to bear alone. His opportunities for 
schooling w-ere few indeed, but his mother's teachings so developed 
his mind that at the age of sixteen he was enabled to matriculate at 
Baldwin University at Berea, Ohio. 

There he remained in nominal attendance on his classes for sev- 
eral years, winning a term's instruction, perhaps, each year by de- 
voting the remainder of that period to the avocation of a commer- 
cial traveler. While on the road as a salesman he continued his 
studies, devoting every moment he could snatch from his business 
to the development of his mind. 

His school books he kept constantly with him, the heavier of his 
two valises being a library from which he drew the knowledge 
which in later years served him in such good stead. The stum- 
bling block of his school days became the foundation stones of his 
studious habits, for then did he acquire the custom of adding to 
the storehouse of his knowledge new insight into subjects which 
have gone to broaden and expand the scope of his remarkable 
career. 

During his roamings as a commercial traveler he gained w-ide and 
valuable knowledge of business, which caused him to give much 
thought to the opportunities open to young men bent on making a 
fortune. In casting about for a larger field of endeavor he decided 
to follow in the footsteps of his father and become a contractor. 

He took his first contract at the age of nineteen years. It was 
for providing cross ties and cordwood to a railroad having its 
terminus at Paris, 111. 

This he followed for eighteen months, successfully, so far as his 
efforts were concerned, but as events turned out, disastrous from 
a financial point of view. The company failed and he received 



nothing lor his long term of toil. Feeling, however, that the ex- 
perience he had gained in the woods was a valuable asset, he de- 
cided to make a study of forestry and pursue it in search of fortune, 
if at some later day he failed to find the golden fleece in other 
fields. 

The fact that this knowledge eventually brought him the nucleus 
of his present fortune is worthy of passing comment. 

His versatility manifested itself at this point, however, and he re- 
turned home and taught school for a year. Then he resumed for a 
time his original calling of commercial traveler, meanwhile con- 
stantly maintaining his pursuit of knowledge. His "line" was 
grindstones, Hon. Fletcher Hulet having commissioned him to 
create a wholesale market for him at Berea. 

During his travels in Wisconsin, in 1862, he was surprised to 
learn that his reputation as a student and apt mathematician had 
preceded him, and that he was spoken of as the probable recipient 
of an ofifer from the state university of Wisconsin to fill the chair 
of mathematics in that institution. Not to overlook any opportu- 
nities, the young traveling man promptly made known to the regents 
of the university his willingness to accept the professorship. Their 
dignified dilatoriness in the matter, however, was too much for 
his ardent, progressive young spirit. 

By the time the chair was properly warm for him, he was flitting 
on his way again, selling grindstones along the upper Mississippi 
at a rate they had never been sold before. 

Fate directed his travels to McGregor, Iowa, where the chance 
remark of a casual acquaintance changed the whole course of his 
life and guided his footsteps into that brilliant pathway of success 
from which he never thereafter swerved. 

The man who thus unconsciously builded so well for Minneapolis 
and the great northwest was J. M. Robinson, of Minneapolis, 
Mr. Robinson told of the glories of the embryo city by the Falls 
of St. Anthony. He painted in brilliant colors the prospects and 
possibilities of the coming metropolis. Won by his word pictures, 
this budding captain of industry within the hour was on his way to 
the city of golden promise. He closed up his afifairs as a commer- 
cial salesman and connected himself immediately with a govern- 
ment surveying party under the leadership of George B. Wright. 

SEES MINNESOTA. 

Quick to grasp the splendid opportunities for the development of 
the metropolis, afforded by Minneapolis' magnificent water power, 
with his usual prompt decision he wrote back to his Ohio home 
to his affianced wife: "I have found the spot where we will make 
our home." For a romance had sprung up during his college days 
in Berea, Ohio. A young woman awaited the word which would 
tell her of the successful outcome of her fiance's quest of fortune. 

Later in the following season Mr. Walker dropped for the nonce 
his business cares. He returned to his parental home. There on 



December 19, 1S63, he was united in wedlock to Harriet G., young- 
est daughter of Hon. Fletcher Hulet, his former employer. 

Mr. Walker's former college president, Rev. J. Wheeler, D. D., 
was the clergyman who linked the lives of these two for a union 
which has since been a partnership for the uplifting of mankind and 
for the rearing of eight children born to them. 

Their home in this city of the west soon became the rendezvous 
of Minneapolis culture. In 1874, when fortune had smiled upon 
the house of Walker, a palatial residence was erected at the corner 
of Eighth Street and Hennepin Avenue, where the family has since 
made its home. 

To this home Mr. Walker brought his affectionate mother and 
there his countless deeds of filial affection were performed until 
1883, when death claimed the noble woman who gave to the world 
one of the men who werfe born to serve humanity and whose prog- 
ress far exceeded her fondest dreams. 

But one other sorrow has come to this happy home. Mr. Walk- 
er's second son, just as life had begun to mature into the promise 
of a successful business career, was suddenly striken with fever 
and in one brief week the family was bereft of one tenderly loved 
and whose cherished memory will live forever in each heart of the 
Walker fireside. 

There was more Indian fighting about the surveying expedition 
upon which Mr. Walker embarked on first reaching Minneapolis 
than there was surveying, however. The little party of sixteen was 
constantly beset and harassed by the red men, who had just then 
started on that path of massacre which dyed with blood the prairies 
and forests of Minnesota. 

After three days of peril the band reached Fort Ripley, which 
they helped to defend for some time. 

Mr. Walker's experience in the government survey service lasted 
nearly three years, after which he engaged for a year in the survey 
of the St. Paul & Duluth Railway. Here his knowledge of forestry 
opened his eyes to the possibilities of the lumber industry in the 
country which he traversed, and resulted in his becoming the pio- 
neer of Minnesota lumber magnates. 

GOES INTO LUMBERING. 

Although he was without sufficient funds at the time to embark 
in lumbering on a large scale, his sterling business qualities com- 
mended him to Dr. Levi Butler and Howard Mills, who took him 
in with them and organized the firm of Butler, Mills & Walker. 
The experience and knowledge which had cost him so dear in his 
youth counted as his capital equally with their money. He managed 
the business of the firm. He superintended the felling of forests 
and he built the mills which transformed those forests into villages 
of symmetrically piled lumber and into towns and hamlets in Minne- 
sota's forests and prairies. 

Personally he operated the camps, the mills and the lumber yards. 



After several years of continued success the firm was dissolved, 
owing to the death of Dr. Butler and the departure of Mr. Mills to 
California in search of health. 

Mr. Walker, however, continued in the business, expanding it by 
leaps and bounds. In some of his undertakings, he was associated 
with Henry T. Welles, particularly in the purchase of pine lands 
and timber. He spread his holdings over northern Minnesota and 
Dakota. St. Anthony Falls whirled the wheels which were now 
turning out his fortune. 

He purchased and operated the J. Dean mill and after the plant 
was destroyed by fire he rebuilt it. For many years he operated 
it with Major George A. Camp under the firm name of Camp & 
Walker. Later he organized the Red River Lumber company, his 
business partner in this instance being his son, Gilbert M. Walker. 
Two mills were established by the firm, one at Crookston, Minn., 
the other at Grand Forks, N. D. 

Mr. Walker is also associated with H. C. Akeley in the firm of 
Walker & Akeley in the ownership of large tracts of pine land, 
but they operate no mills. 

Mr. Walker has not confined his attention solely to the lumber 
business, however. He has been closely identified with the growth 
of Minneapolis in every branch of its commercial development. The 
Central Market and Commission row are his creations. The mar- 
ket, designed to confine the wholesale commission business as well 
as other wholesale lines, to the district north of Hennepin avenue 
and west of Fourth street, is considered a model of its kind through- 
out the country. It is largely due to the establishment of Commis- 
sion row that the fruit and commission business of Minneapolis is 
greater than that of any other city in the northwest. 

Mr. Walker is largely responsible for the existence of St. Louis 
Park, a suburb of Minneapolis, built upon a tract of land owned by 
Mr. Walker, by the Land and Investment company. Mr. Walker 
was the originator of the Business Men's Union, which for many 
years was a potent factor in the development of the city. He is an 
ardent patron of the Y. M. C. A., giving to it freely of his time and 
money and enjoying the distinction of being a member of the na- 
tional committee; for in the development of his career a trend 
toward things religious and philanthropic asserted itself. With 
his wife Mr. Walker has turned his attention to and dealt gener- 
ously for the uplifting of the fallen and the needy. Were his place 
in the world of trade not so firmly established, he might be known 
of men for his good deeds alone. 

Mr. Walker's career has been remarkable for originality of 
method and strict business integrity. His word has always been as 
good as his bond. Extremely liberal in the use of his wealth his 
charities are unlimited; all classes have been more or less benefited 
by his beneficence. At the time of the grasshopper visitation in 
1875, by which the farmers of the western part of the state of Min- 
nesota were reduced to a condition of poverty and semi-starvation 



pitiful to contemplate, Mr. Walker's efforts in behalf of suffering 
humanity were untiring. 

As soon as the grasshopper scourge had disappeared he organized 
a scheme for the raising of a late crop that was of inestimable value 
to settlers. He bought up all the turnip seed and likewise that of 
buckwheat to be had in the twin cities and Chicago. 

He visited the afflicted sections. He made up the seed into paper 
packages and hiring teams he conducted a systematic distribution 
over many townships. The season was so far advanced that only 
these late crops could be attempted. 

News of his free distribution of seeds spread as if on the wing 
and many farmers walked fifteen or twenty miles to meet the teams 
and thus avail themselves of Air. Walker's beneficence. 

For many years he was one of the managers of the state reform 
school, laboring untiringly for the reclaiming of waifs on the 
world's tide. 

But as one settles on this phase of Mr. Walker's many sided 
character and decides him preeminent for philanthropy, some other 
bent stands out. Therein he is truly like the German emperor, 
for hardly does the narrator turn to what he would term a distin- 
guishing characteristic, than this noble-minded man stands forth 
in the light of a student and writer. Then, as this talent looms out, 
apparently distinguishing him from others, comes a hint of artistic 
discrimination, and one delves in the depths of a love for the beauti- 
ful, as manifested in the patronage of art, drawing inspiration for a 
sketch of a man known far and near as a connoisseur. 

INTERESTED IN THE LIBRARY. 

Looking for a moment on Air. Walker's literary turn of mind, 
his labors of love for his fellow man in the establishment of 
libraries present themselves. For fifteen years or more Mr. Walker 
worked systematically and persistently to build up the old Athe- 
naeum — a joint stock company — into a fine public library, and 
through the agency, assistance and good will of various other citi- 
zens he succeeded in the great task. Recognizing his achievement, 
the library board insisted on his acting as its president. 

For many years he worked amidst the most persistent and deter- 
mined opposition from various persons and was seriously misunder- 
stood and misapprehended. The records of these years show 
numerous communications, personal letters and criticisms and his 
answers, regarding the part taken by him in the old Athenaeum in 
his endeavors to change it from a rigid, close corporation into this 
public institution, which is now a source of so much pride and sat- 
isfaction to the people; 

No man in the state has taken greater interest or a more active 
part in any public institution than he has in this, expending a large 
amount of time and money in working the desired transformation. 
The magnificent library building of the city of Minneapolis may be 
said to be a monument to his perseverance. It contains not only a 



splendid library but also is the home of the Minnesota Academy of 
Natural Science, an institution with which Mr. Walker has been 
identified for years and which he has helped more materially than 
any other man. 

In this building also dwells the Minneapolis Society of Fine Arts 
and its art gallery, which contains many choice paintings, is made 
the richer by loans of some of Mr. Walker's choicest canvases. 

In aiding to develop the public library Mr. Walker has not lost 
sight of book collecting to gratify his personal, private tastes. On 
the shelves in his home may be found scores of valuable volumes 
dealing with science, art, theology and philosophy. 

This retreat is his delight and in hours of ease he gives himself 
up to the research and Study for which the mind of the youth in 
college days hungered with little opportunity for gratification. 

Here in his years of maturity his boyhood dreams are realized, 
iciere he communes with the master minds whose teachings were 
vienied him in his boyhood and from the erudition thus nurtured 
and ripened he takes keen delight in giving to the world literary 
works which mirror his talents and reflect the soul of a man who 
has known God and held His image ever before him in his struggles 
through the drear valley of cold, hard commercialism, too often 
honeycombed by iniquitous pitfalls and glittering temptations of a 
pathway paved with gold. 

Turning his versatile mind from literature to art Mr. Walker has 
for a score of years past been directing much of his attention to the 
collection of paintings, bronzes, marbles and other works of art. 
He bears a wide reputation of being a connoisseur of rare dis- 
crimination. Yearly he searches the studios and ateliers for arti- 
cles of virtu, for canvases enriched by the genius of old masters 
and modern. 

His collection today rivals that of the best eastern collector and 
the owner himself is frequently surprised at the high comparative 
rating given this collection by those who have seen the world's best 
galleries and who do not hesitate to place this in the first rank. 
These are the artists whose canvases line the walls of the Walker 
gallery: 

GEMS OF THE COLLECTION. 

Achenbach, Anastasi, Anders, Barker, Benedictor, Berry, Bier- 
stadt, Bogert, Bol, Bonheur, Rosa; Bonheur, August Francois; 
Bothbouguereau, Boulanger, Breton, Brown, Busson, Cabanel, 
Cazin, Cederstrom, Chaigneau, Cipriani, Glaus, Goomans, Gorot, 
Grochepierre, Grome, Guyp, Dahl, David, De Brush, DeHaas, 
Delphy, Demont-Breton, Deve, Diaz, Dupre, Ernst, Essenlins, 
Faulkner, Ferrier, Foscari, Francais, Franck,'Frere, Froment, Gains- 
borough, Gericault, Hamilton, Hamman, Hart, James M.; Hart, 
William, Hermann, Hire, Hogarth, Ingres, Inness, Isabey, Jacque, 
Jacpuin, Jazet, Jettell, Johnson, os, Julien, Kaufmann, Kaulbach, 
Klombeck, Verboeckhoven, Knaus, Laurens, Lawrence, LeBrun, 
LeGomptedu, Nuoy, Lefebre, Lefevre, Lely, Lemmens, Lerolle, 



Leveridgc, Lossow, Loiitherbourg, JNIaes, ]Marihat, Martaens, Alas- 
sani, Mesgregny, Matsu, iMichel, Minor, Monticelli, Aloran, Morland, 
Parrocel, Parton, Peale, Pezant, Phillippoteau, Plassan, Pokitanow, 
Poole, Pyne, Rau, Richet, Riedel, Ritzberger, Rix, Robie, Rosier, 
Rousseau, Ruisbael, Schandel,' Schenck, Schreiber, Schriner, 
Schreyer, Schuch, Schusselle, Siiikel, Smith, Tait, Thorp, Turner, 
Unterberger, Vander Venne, Van Marcke, Verboeckhoven, 
Vernet, Veronese, Vibert, Buyllcfroy, Walker, Watson, Weisse, 
West, Westerbeek, Wilson, Zanpighi, Zein, Beechey, Carpentire, 
Coello, Cotes, Coypel, Harpignies, Holbein, Kauffmann, Laurence, 
Max, Opie, Del Piombo, Pourbus, Raeburn, Raphael, Van Rijn, 
Reni, Rigaud, Rubens, Van Dyck, Bercke-Heyde. 

This list of names is incomplete, in that Mr. Walker is constant- 
ly adding to his splendid collection. For the most part, it is hung 
in his private art gallery, a spacious series of rooms which form a 
part of his beautiful residence near the public library building. In 
the latter structure are some half a hundred more of Mr. Walker's 
paintings, loaned to the city that visitors to this home of culture 
may feast their eyes upon its treasures. 

And here again does Mr. Walker's ever-dominant philanthropy 
assert itself. For not satisfied with giving to the eyes of public 
library visitors the pleasure and profit of a view of his canvases 
which he has loaned to the city, Mr. Walker throws his private gal- 
lery open to the public, refusing to seclude from the public eye, as 
does the selfish art collector, the treasures of his quest in painters' 
retreats. 

This private gallery is daily visited by lovers of art. It is one of 
the well-known and much sought places of interest in Minneapolis 
and to its doors are welcomed the man of lowly rank as well as the 
traveler in search of a feast of art. 

This, then, is the manner of man who is recognized as Minneapo- 
lis' foremost citizen. A close glance at his character reveals a man 
of strength — one with whom to plan is to execute and whose mar- 
velous powers of grasping details and systematizing all of his under- 
takings, combined with his unswerving tenacity of purpose, his im- 
penetrable integrity, render him one who knows not what it means 
to fail, once he sets out to accomplish a thing which his analytical 
mind has told him is possible of accomplishment. He is an earnest 
Christian, who strives to communicate to all with whom he comes 
in contact in his daily life that God-fearing, hnmanitarian spirit 
which has filled his soul to overflowing from the time he first lisped 
his prayers at his mother's knee in the little Ohio home. Modest 
withal, domestic in his tastes, he yet finds time to build for the bet- 
terment of man and municipality, and when the feet of future gen- 
erations tread the corridors of Minneapolis' hall of fame, first in 
the niches of her sainted sons will be the noble figure of Thomas 
Barlow Walker. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



016 085 449 2 



